


Epic Empty Escape

by Rainbowraptor



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Dean Winchester to the Rescue, F/F, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Happy Dean Winchester, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Season Finale, Season/Series 15, The Empty (Supernatural)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-17
Updated: 2021-01-17
Packaged: 2021-03-15 06:00:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28808487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rainbowraptor/pseuds/Rainbowraptor
Summary: Curled up in the bed, on top of the covers, the warm body of Miracle by his side, Dean stares at the far corner of his room, eyes aching and a little wet. He'd messed up bad this time, he guesses, if Cas still isn't back after Jack poofed the world's population into pre-Chuck hissy fit status.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester, Charlie Bradbury/Stevie (Supernatural: The Rupture), Eileen Leahy/Sam Winchester, Jo Harvelle/Anna Milton
Comments: 2
Kudos: 61





	1. Rescue Time

**Author's Note:**

> Oh boy, been awhile since I've posted a story on Ao3, last year in in August I think actually, but hey, I got pulled back into the SPN fandom and just had to write so here it is, I hope you all enjoy my alternate season 15 finale.
> 
> This chapter is the full story but there's a little bonus chapter I'll be posting later. Might also elaborate more on the Questing Beast's origins at some point down the road. 
> 
> Final things, I apologise for any mistakes there still might be in this thing, I worked hard to fix everything. I also had to change the story from past tense to present because it read horribly the first way. Hopefully it works out for the rest of you.
> 
> Have fun!!! 
> 
> And hey, thank you.

Curled up in the bed, on top of the covers, the warm body of Miracle by his side, Dean stares at the far corner of his room, eyes aching and a little wet. He'd messed up bad this time, he guesses, if Cas still isn't back after Jack poofed the world's population into pre-Chuck hissy fit status. 

The clock says 3 am. 

Dean thinks maybe just one more hour,  _ just one _ , and Cas will be here. After everything the angel said, yeah, definitely  _ had  _ to come back. Yes Dean had called a couple of times, no,  _ not  _ to listen to Cas' voice recording, but to try and let Cas know that, well, to let Cas know he was wanted. Dude hadn't answered. Dean ran his hands over his face. He'll punch him. OK, maybe not punch him, guy deserved  _ something _ for making Dean wait so long but not to be attacked.

Maybe a jab at the angel for missing the big showdown.

_ Hey look who's finally here, get lost with Venom? _

No that was terrible. He's past all the bullshit now. If...no  _ when  _ Cas comes back, Dean is going to-.

Dean's stomach rumbles.

Miracle lifts his furry head and lay it on Dean's hip. He pats the dog, lifting himself half up on an elbow. Dean rests his face to sit on his other hand with a weary groan. "Maybe we should get a sandwich. I'll even put on extra mustard for you."

Miracle whines then hops up to stand on the bed.

"Dean!" Says a voice.

The elder Winchester brother leaps to his feet, so ready to say a million different things that his jaw wires shut. But it isn't a certain blue eyed angel that greets Dean in his room.

It's God. 

Jack is dressed so simply, more like a small city farm boy instead of God, the pale jacket, t-shirt and jeans. Still so hard to see him as anything as their son. Nice to know that Godhood hadn't made him a suit man. "I can't get him out, the Empty won't let him go willingly." The new God looks a little upset, pulling a bitch face like Sammy, frustrated, head cocked in a painfully familiar way.

Dean stares, shrugs his shoulders, "Yeah, so what?" He doesn't ask who 'Him' is, even Dean isn't that thick, in denial. "Pull rank, tell that bastard how it is and-"

Jack shakes his head. "No, I won't be like Chuck. Boundaries, limits. And-"

Dean's heart drops. Anger rise, flaring wings. "Seriously? So Cas is what, stuck there because you don't want to ruin your first day or something?"

Jack is silent. Calm.

They both know it's not fair. Dean remembers the promise Jack made a few hours ago. Remembers the years of celestial assholes being too involved and too overbearing. 

"So... what do you want me to say? 'Thanks for letting me know my best friend is stuck in Turbo Hell because of me and I can't get him out?' alright, fine. It's…" Dean feels the tears starting again and he sits on the bed, letting Miracle rest his head in his lap. The weight of the dog felt comfortable. Safe. Grounding.

"Oh." Jack says. " _I_ can't do anything. As I was saying, The Empty is different since I blew up in it, angry, unsettled, my powers won't reach into it, I tried." He smiles. "But you...well _you_ _and your brother_ , that's something else. I'm not Chuck. I'm not Death. I'm Jack. I'm God. The Shadow is defending against my kind of interference, but two humans..."

Dean squints at his son. "So...you're saying…"

"I'm not about to stand in between Winchesters." Jack says with the most awkward wink. Like his  _ other  _ dad.

Dean stands up again, this time, excited, alive and thinking of the fight ahead. They are doing this, they are going to get his angel back. "Alright! So what do we do? How do we save Cas?"

"Like it always goes, see, there's a book." And so Jack explains…

* * *

"You ready?" Charlie asks, back flush against the stoney side of the catacombs, breathing hard.

Stevie nods. "Hell yeah." She says, clutching two guns in both hands. She looks ready and excited. 

The two share a kiss, quick and full of joy. Really they should be more alert and focused on the mission, back up the rest of the team on this breaking and entering into an ancient chamber of reverence for the death and resting of angels and demons alike, but, Dean guessed, since being restored, well, no one had forever.

OG Charlie (no Dean didn't call her that, Charlie had insisted upon learning that there was another Charlie from an apocalypse world) had even turned down the brother's request to retrieve the shiny new book, something about a date with a Princess Leia cosplayer.

Dean feels a pang of longing watching them, thinking of blue eyes-

"Go!" Shouts Eileen.

All five of them beat down the large doors, easy with the boost from their spell enhanced strength. Stone falls on stone, dust rushing from the impact, cracks spreading along the door and floor, a faint blue silver light flashing in the damage, then dies. The room itself is about as large as a medium sized bedroom, ancient shelves decorated with knick knacks and urns. 

Eileen roams around the room, studying the contents, not touching anything at all. She stops, shaking her head. "No book." 

There _ is _ a weird tacky jeweled coffin in the center though and if Dean knows anything about shit like this, it means that the book is in that tacky jeweled coffin.

"Help me Sammy." Dean barks, lurching forward without so much as a warning and pushing up on the heavy lid.

"Dean…" Sam starts but eventually caves, going to help his brother. Eileen follows suit, crushing against Sam as they wrestled the lid.

"Hurry up." Warns Stevie from her post at the door. "I've got a bad, bad feeling about this place. Somethings...off." 

"Yeah, yeah," Dean groans. "Charlie?" He's hurrying, but from more than fear.

"Oh, oh, ok, hold on bro." Charlie leaves Stevie's side to aid in the robbing. 

There's a sharp crack, a thump, and then the lid flips off, crashing to the ground with such force and such speed, Dean almost has crushed toes to go with his crushed heart. 

Damn he is getting sappy.

"Fuck!" Dean hisses. But it isn't the lid he's cursing or his chick flick thoughts. Deep inside the coffin, there's a body. An inhuman body. A emaciated, marred body of a huge ass dog, a hellhound, Dean knew, he's seen enough in Hell and in hunting, but not like a hellhound he's ever seen. They can see it for one. Two, the thing looks like a giant Doberman with weird tendril things coming from it's back, tendrils with fangs, and what looks like the bones of wings too. 

The hellhound's front and back legs are curled around a thin and silvery blue book embroidered with ink black letters he recognized as the language of the angels. 

_ The _ book. 

"Fuck." Dean hisses again. 

For a weird, awkward moment, the three stand around the coffin, staring down at the twisted form of the monster and the book. The brilliant glare of the full moon catching them in a daze.

Dean, Sam, Eileen, Stevie, and Charlie look at each other. 

"Not it!" Shout Charlie and Stevie.

Sam and Dean play rock-paper-scissors.

"Son of a bitch!" Dean groans, rolls his eyes, then stares down at the dead monstrosity. "This is now mine Fido, deal." Dean says right before he dives forward and snaps the book from the hellhound's body.

There's a howl. A smell of sulfur strangely mixed with gloves of cinnamon and the smell of a storm, all ozone and electricity. The hellhound's flesh goes from grey to pale white, shimmering like glittering snow. The ink black tendrils, Leviathans, that's all they can be, quiver, shake from sleep, rising, snapping their jaws in hunger. A brilliant flash and large glowing blue wings snap open on the beast's back as it begins to rise on terrible demonic back hooves. It lifts it's head, horned and snarling, pale ice eyes blazing.

"Scatter!!!" Charlie yelps.

And scatter they do.

Dean, Sam, Eileen, Charlie, and Stevie run from the tomb, the now car sized angel/demon/leviathan/dog hybrid  _ monstrosity _ tearing after them on hooves and claws, howling and slathering.

"Fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck!" Dean screams. "Jack could've warned us!!!" He clutches the book tight in his arms as they make for the car.

"Well, Jack said it was guarded!" Sam yells. 

Eileen doesn't say anything but looks afraid. Even without being able to hear and things being too fast and chaotic to read lips, she gets the gist of what they were saying. "Behind the van!" She shouts finally.

They dive for the shiny black vehicle, sitting just beyond the clearing in the distance, wreathed in a wispy thin layer of fog.

Almost there. 

"Did he say it was guarded by a damn Pokemon?!?" Charlie whines.

"Digimon, more like a Digimon!" Stevie corrects. 

"Yeah, she's right!" Sam says. 

Just in the clearing now.

"Shut up nerds and find out how to kill it!" But he also agrees with Stevie and Sammy, thing is too damn terrifying for a Pokemon design. Dean skids to a stop, shoes sliding on in the loamy earth as he turns. "Sammy, catch!"

He hurls the book to Sam like a square frisbee as his brother runs past with the girls. "I'll slow it down, you read the book to find out how to kill it!"

"Dean, no!' Sam protests. 

"I swear to Jack, Sammy, if you ruin this for us, Castiel, I'll...just do it! And if I fuck up, just...tell Cas…-"

What he wants to say is lost in the scream and ghostly howl of the hound. It's caught up and slows to a canter, facing down Dean in the clearing. 

He's always interrupted when it comes to Cas isn't he?

Dean hopes Sam, Eileen, Charlie, and Stevie are hiding behind the van now. He doesn't dare look away from the blue eyed white beast before him. He clenches one fist, then points at the thing with his other. "Why don't you go back to sleep, Clifford? I promise we'll bring the book back when we're done!" 

_ Please don't eat me, I have one more person to save _ , he thinks.

The monstrous yet somehow still beautiful creature paces back and forth in front of Dean, long lion tail swishing. It's long snout, riddled with sharp teeth, opens and it speaks.

Dean recalls the first day on Earth, back from Hell. Castiel's voice, booming, shattering glass, shaking the foundations of buildings, rupturing his ear drums, jarring his bones. 

This Freakshow, whatever it is, it's voice comes close to doing the same.

Dean falls to his knees, hands over his ears, drops his gun. 

" **WHAT DO YOU WISH TO ASK ME?"** Said the beast.

Dean whimpers. The pain's too much, worse than Cas' screaming that first day, on a new level and he's going to fail, fail Castiel again.

"Sammy?! What do we do?!?" Dean yells at the top of his lungs, hoping his little brother can hear him. 

"Dean...the book...the book there's no pages!" Sam screams, panicked

" **WHAT DO YOU WISH TO ASK ME?"** The beast questions again, still pacing, snow white fur bristling in a sort of weird patient annoyance.

His ears are bleeding. Dean's vision is going dark. There's Cas' face, he's crying, had Castiel ever cried before then, that horrible and somehow glorious night in the dungeon? Dean can't remember. There's that weird shadowy mass, consuming Cas again, ripping the angel away before Dean can tell him anything. The Shadow, taking away the one person...before Dean can say, before he can tell him-

"How do we get an angel back from the Empty?" Eileen, he can barely hear her. Dean looks up, focuses as hard as he can through the pain. There she is, standing tall, facing the glowing monster beside Dean. 

The monster stills, sits down, looking all the while like a good dog, even it's tendrils are relaxed, eyeless heads facing Eileen. " **RETURN TO THE ANGEL'S FIRST SPARK, MAKE THE CIRCLE, CENTER THE BOND, PRAY, SPELL THE DOOR."** The words come out from a thousand howling voices, almost a song. It hurts Dean and from the sound from behind him, he knows it hurts Charlie, Sam, and Stevie too.

But Elieen, while she has a pained look on her face from the vibrations, she can speak and talk to the jet plane level of noise. She's afraid but brave.

Sam is lucky as hell.

"Can you be more clear and is there anything else we should know?" Eileen asks. Smart.

The beast sits straighter, puffing it's chest. " **RETURN TO THE ANGEL'S ARRIVAL TO THE RIGHTEOUS MAN, MAKE A SPELL CIRCLE, PLACE IMPORTANT PIECE IN THE MIDDLE, PRAY, SPELL. THE. DOOR!"**

Is it Dean or does the huge monster sound a little P. O'd?

"What spell?" Not Eileen, Stevie. She shouts from behind the van. 

The hellhound lowers its head and suddenly... disperses into a shower of blue, black, silver, and white. But the lights didn't vanish, they swirl, like sand, and rush past Dean and Eileen.

"Sam!" Dean shouts, spinning around just in time to follow the sight of the energy dance high in the air and then dip behind the van where Sam, Charlie, and Stevie are. 

"Charlie? Stevie?" Eileen and Dean run and find-

Sam standing, holding a shimmering book in his hands, open, and now with white pages. 

"Whoa." Charlie says.

"Questing Beast?" Stevie saus, reading from the shiny black letters written in clear English. "That this...this book...it's  _ the  _ Questing Beast?" She shakes her head. "Winchesters." But she has a smile on her face. "Make for a damn fun date." Stevie takes Charlie's hand in hers.

Charlie laughs. "Oh, so we don't have to kill the pretty monster, awesome."

Dean really should feel like crashing but he's too filled with buzzing adrenaline to stop now. "Not so fast. What else does it say in that book?"

Sam reads. "Oh, wow, so this thing, this Questing Beast, it's actually a weapon specifically for taking out the Empty, built by a rogue angel and a demon, they didn't like their kind being sent there. And there's a spell...I guess for the door." He looks up. "So all we need to do is get the ingredients and figure out the rest of the instructions."

" So...where did you first meet Cas?" Sam asks.

Dean swallows. A pale face, blue eyes, messy hair, and an expression of no shock whatsoever after being stabbed in the chest. The flickering lighting. Dean blinks back to the present."I know what we have to do...where we need to go."

* * *

But first were the ingredients and oh boy...

Getting the unicorn hair is an exercise in crazy. While Sam is ecstatic with wrangling the last unicorn on a beach in Florida of all places, Dean hates every second he has to pick sand out of his shoes when they get home. 

Leviathan spit is easier, there's a sample in the bunker along with some demon blood. 

But then is the final ingredient for the door. A piece of a fallen angel's restored grace. 

"Jack!" Dean prays over his bowl of mac and cheese, more than slightly burnt because Sammy had tried to cook and had failed but Dean didn't care enough to make anything else. "We could use this last bit of help, you know, if you aren't too busy."

There's a roll of thunder in the distance and then the ring of his phone. When Dean looks at the screen, the picture of a very familiar gnarled and large oak tree greets him. 

"She's waiting for you there." -Jack. The message reads.

Dean puts down his phone next to his barely touched mac and cheese. He silently wishes they could just go get another unicorn part, maybe some jizz, anything but having to face  _ her _ again. 

* * *

The Empty is different than before. So much. For one, Castiel is awake. But he doesn't simply find himself on a cold invisible floor.

It's much worse.

There are times in the sea of calm for Castiel, the inky, shiny, black ocean of nothing. Peace, tranquility, and rest. In this, he can't think, not as he did once before, there are no thoughts, no fears, no loss, just the bare formation of feelings. Happy. Soothing. Quiet. Still. The cool reflective surface of a vast lake. 

There are times where he can't help but fight, times when the world beyond the Empty shifts and shakes so much that he somehow awakes, falls deeper below the waves, sinks, heavy in the trenchcoat he doesn't need to wear but finds himself in. These times, Castiel drowns in his regrets, his wants, his worst memories. They start simple. Silly even. Like a ghost, he fixates on things left undone, left in tatters, left broken...cancer, grows toxic, heavy, choking, a mad and sudden tangle of the worst, wrapping around his entire body and dragging him down into a maw of sadness.

Names.

_ Meg _

_ Rowena  _

_ Anna _

_ Bobby _

_ Jo _

_ Jack _

_ Sam _

_ April _

_ Bobby _

_ All of Heaven _

So many, many others…

And when he reaches the near bottom, there lay the worst regrets of them all.

_ Dean... _

He should have told the human sooner, should have been stronger, should have held on tighter, should have, should have-

_ Give up, it's time to rest. Be still, be silent.  _ Says the Entity. The Shadow, it's maddening true form hidden behind Castiel's still closed eyes. But he can  _ feel _ it, it burns, the endless mass of toothed limbs, sandpaper and cold _ ,  _ sour milk on his flesh _. Peace. _ It whispers to him.  _ Sleep _ . It hisses.

A voice is screaming, wailing.

_ "Out! I want out!!!" _

_ Ruby _ .

Someone is singing, eyes flashing with lightning, raging, calling " _ Father, Father!" _

_ Raphael. _

It is so very uncomfortable, so terribly loud. 

The Shadow... they have to continue to soothe and suffocate their charges. It's an endless new challenge. The Entity is wearing down. Something is different. Was it Jack? Did he damage them when he detonated?

Yet these memories…

Castiel killed so many and Dean...he is safe and he made a deal so Castiel must…

_ Sleep. _

So Castiel listens to the Shadow's call, he relaxes, lets go and thus he falls back asleep, slowly rising to the calm surface once again.

* * *

Sam understandably dosen't look too happy to visit Anna Milton. He hasn't even told Eileen about this trip out of fear of her getting hurt. But he'd refuses to stay at the bunker. So he sits beside Dean, his bitch face at turned up to 110 percent. "Dean," he says, frowning and staring forward ahead at the impossibly large tree outside. "How can we trust her?"

"Well, for one thing, I don't think Jack would dick us around like that."

"Like he told us about the Questing Beast?" Sam asks, waving the said book. It's so small, like a children's book, or a pamphlet about a psoriasis.

"This feels different." Dean says. "Just, do me a favor and stay in the car." 

"Dean, what is with you? Ever since the fight with Chuck, hell, even before that, you've been acting weird. What happened-?"

Dean sets his jaw so hard he felt his back molars ache. A mass of dark something wrapping around Castiel, swallowing him up right after...

_ "I love you _ ."

"Cas...he…" Dean starts, because, now, here, Dean feels that he needs to get it off his chest, especially after everything he and Sam have gone through, especially since Sam is the one he wants to talk about  _ this _ with, but the words are again trapped behind his teeth. A huge wad of gum sticking everything together. 

"I'll explain later, after we get Cas back, alright? Sammy, trust me." Dean pats Sam on the arm.

Sam is quiet. His little brother looks so pained than ever right now and it hurts Dean's heart, a spike to the chest. But the younger Winchester nods. 

And, for a split second, Dean sees something in Sam's face.  _ He knows _ . But it's not a bad feeling like so many times before.  _ Sammy knows, probably always has.  _

His baby brother grins. "Alright, but if she does anything weird, I'm there. We have to get Cas back and if that means ganking her…"

Dean smiles, pats Sam on the shoulder, and steps out of the car. 

The fall sun is brilliant, dazzling on the oak tree leaves underneath, a carpet of orange and red. Up close, the tree smells of nutmeg and flames and a distant tang of tornadoes. Dean presses a hand on the bark, feels the roughness of it all. 

"Dean Winchester." Anna says.

Dean looks up and there she is, all pale skin, flaming red hair, and deep, deep green eyes, slim, dressed in a long moss green jacket, black blouse, blue jeans, and fluffy boots. Still beautiful, still fierce. He can taste her now, a memory of the two of them, intertwined in the back of the Impala, what feels like so long ago. A sweet moment yet tinged with desperation and longing. He recalls also of her killing his brother to try and stop the apocalypse, her constant apologies as she did so. He tenses up, not sure what to expect even with Jack's guidance.

"Anna." Dean says.

She smiles. "It's been far too long."

"How are you back?" Dean asks. "You died right? So that means you went to the Empty? How the hell did you get out and Castiel can't?"

Anna's smile becomes a smirk. "Before Jack, Chuck had plans for me, they didn't pan out." She looks at the tree. "So I hear you need some of my grace?" 

Dean rubs the back of his neck. "Um, yeah."

"To get Castiel back?" Anna asks.

"Yeah." Dean says, fear and fury winding up his gut. If she says no, if she refuses, he'd have to kill her. He will. He won't hesitate. The angel blade is in his sleeve.

Her eyes flick back to his with such a knowing look, fine eyebrows slightly raised, still smirking. "OK."

Dean blinks. "You...what...OK? Just like that?"

Anna nods. "Yeah, just like that. Actually, you can have it all." She puts her hand under the top of her blouse then pulls out a single glass vial attached to her necklace. With one easy movement, she pulls it off and holds it out to Dean. "I don't need it anymore."

Dean takes the offering, carefully and with dumbstruck reverence. It's strangely cool to the touch, as always. "Not like I should be looking for problems or complaining, but, why?" 

Anna shrugs, dropped her eyes to the ground, gave a little kick, sending a few leaves tumbling over before lifting her head, taking a deep breath. "Chocolate cake." Anna saya. "And sex." She winks. "Once you go human, well, it's hard to go back. Sure angels can experience some of what humans have but it's not the same and then...there's the aging." Anna smiles. "And after that, I won't have to go back to the Empty. That's enough."

Her smile is odd, devious. 

"What aren't you telling me Anna?" Dean dosen't think it's bad, not a big bad evil smile, yet it still bothers him. "You're hiding something."

Anna winks. "Castiel isn't the only one who fell in love with a human.' Anna leans forward and kisses Dean gently on the cheek. "Tell Sam I'm really sorry." With that she turns and walks several feet towards the tree. 

Another vehicle pulls out from behind it, a truck, driven by what looked like a blond haired woman...no…

"Jo…?" Dean whispers. But Ellen and Jo had...but before he can bring his voice up above a whisper, the truck shudders and putters off in a whirl of dust, scattered leaves, and a flurry of hope.

He needs to bake Jack another cake, maybe leave a few Snickers at an alter or something, fuck.

* * *

Castiel awakes again. He sinks, again. The memories are terrible. Hot, scalding, grateting high pitched, repetitive, annoying, and biting. He feels another being, awake and writhing beside him. They are odd, full of sarcastic joy, even in this pit of agony. Laughing, giggling, in their sleep.

They touch his back and an odd, powerful flare of gold power runs down those fingers deep, deep into his grace, healing, soothing. 

Castiel feels his ashy, broken wings crackle, snap, pop, back to life. Rainbow metallic blades for feathers, dark as oil slicks, strong and ready for flight, for fight, and Castiel has the urge to sing.

A giggle, the taste of cotton candy and the flickering of a television. 

Castiel has one single thought. A name.

_ Gabriel?  _

Silence from the archangel. They are Gabriel. There is a moment where Castiel thinks that he will wake up again, maybe together they can escape, deal be damned, but Castiel feels that Gabriel has been put back under, he himself feels the overwhelming urge to rest. It surges up to settle his mind. He wants to lay his head down. 

_ Sleep _ . Says the Entity. There is a tinge of anger.

But Castiel listens and does sleep once again.

* * *

"We got all the ingredients so now you need to tell us where we're going to set things up." Sam says. 

Dean, Eileen, and Sam sit at the big meeting table, plans and maps laid out, the book in front of Dean like a shimmery silver notebook of doom. Sam looks at Dean, waiting, leans forward in his chair.

Eileen is mixing the potion, hand steady and sure, focused completely on the small mixing bowl before her. 

Dean wastes no more time. "As soon as Eileen finishes cooking that thing, we gotta go back to the barn."

Sam looks confused. "A barn?"

" _ The _ barn, Sammy, where I first met Cas, where he first, ya know, showed his feathery trenchcoat wearing ass. That barn." Dean thinks of sparks, lights, the shadows of large immense wings. "We have to go there to open the door. "

"Done!" Eileen signs to Sam and Dean enthusiastically.

"You heard her Sammy, let's go!" 

* * *

It's the same. The barn is completely and utterly the same. Dean drives to the place easily, he could've found it with his eyes closed, he's sure, follows the pull in his gut toward it and there it is, all greyish blue in the night. The locals didn't go near it. They said it was a holy place. Off limits. Dean is glad for that at least, no chance of interruptions. 

Well, from regular humans and low level beasts at least. The wards and everything are still painted on the walls.

They set up inside, Sam and Eileen drawing up the circle, Dean helping when he could, but really, Dean, Dean, well, he feels taught, sweaty, and amped all at the same second. This is the time then, the moment where he will go down into the Empty and rescue his friend…

_ Friend _ . And here's the part where his throat closes up and his ears burns.  _ Friend _ .  _ Right _ . 

Dean swallows. 

Sam moves some hair from his face. "Circle is done, door is drawn, all we have to do is the prayer and...Center the Bond..."

Dean looks up at Sam and in that moment he knows his genius of a brother has an idea of what  _ that  _ bit meant. 'I gotta get in the middle of the circle." Dean says. "And then, I'm going into the Empty and I'm pulling Cas out."

Sam wants to argue. Dean can tell. The flexing jaw, the angry moose eyes, that wrinkled forehead, but didn't. He knows Dean has to do this on his own. "OK, time to get our angel back." Sam says.

Dean steps inside the pentagram, standing in front or the door painted above the circle in the hay and dirt littered floor. It's a simple rectangle, shining silver, black, and blue, decorated with black sigils from the book. 

"Ready?" Sam asks. 

Dean nods. "Let's do this."

As they say the spell, there's a loud howl and the Questing Beast appears, large, towering, it takes Dean in it'd massive jaws by the back of his jacket, throws him in the air, and finally, luckily, catches him on its back.

"Holy---!!" Dean begins, but before he can say anymore, the great beast leaps up, so high Dean's hair brushes the barns rafters. They crash towards the door painted on the ground, down and through the suddenly glowing, gaping portal of bright light and they are gone.

* * *

A great deep, rolling, thrashing, simmering icy boil awakes Castiel this time. A piercing flash spiking in the mind, the feel of those teeth dragging on his being, ache, too loud, too much, too rough, and too cold. 

A sort of roar, screaming, distant howling…

Voices clamoring.

A wave of consciousness rolls out over all the beings in the Empty as a flash of soothing blue, silver, and black tinged light but they don't sink deeper. They rise, up, up. There are no memories of failures, mistakes, just being awake in a collision of nothing and the explosion of everything. 

The angels and demons on the Empty are all awake.

The Entity is wailing, crying , and sobbing, a mess of toothed tendrils twirling and rocking to and fro. They can't hold down an imitation form, are left with what Castiel can only guess is their true form, at least, whatever is closet to what his mind can comprehend. Perhaps Jack's detonation changed that too. 

" _ No, no, quiet, too loud, too bright! _ " Wails the Shadow.

Castiel feels for the Entity, he does. How can he not? They had helped him and his family when the time had come, yes a deal had been involved but this, this seemed cruel.

And yet…

Castiel stands in the familiar void, suddenly surrounded by millions of others, demon and angel faces towards the burst of energy, here in the black, dripping with that inky dark substance, unified in confusion, fear, and awe. 

That light is blinding and so entrancing. A single immense lamp in the ebony walls of the Empty.

On a new, strange horizon, there is a quick retraction of the light, condensing, shrinking until it's nothing but a mere shimmery aura encompassing a human shaped figure. 

The figure approaches with a dazed yet determined gait and Castiel begins to see features, a thin sharp nose, cheek bones, green eyes. Pale freckles.

_ Dean _ . Castiel takes a step forward in the crowd. 

A form drops from somewhere, no, more as if the very dark surrounding around them, the black void they inhabit, rushes through the mass of souls trapped here, cords of toothy, tangles threading toward the center. Everyone makes room, retreats. Cas is pushed back in the throng and the Entity rises as a towering quivering insanity inducing mass, mouths screaming, limbs whipping about in frustration, becoming massive with the addition of part of their surroundings.

_ "You!" _ The Entity hisses.

The figure, Dean, hesitates, only for a second. But then keeps approaching. "Hey, I'm here to pick up my angel."

Castiel's heart leaps a little.  _ Foolish _ . He doesn't know if he's thinking of Dean or himself at the moment. Both most likely. Oh but how he loves Dean.

"Deano!" Shouts Gabriel. 

Dean turns to look at Castiel's older brother and blinks. "Well, hell, funny seeing you here. Man, this place is hopping."

_ "Enough!!!" _ The Entity snarls and lashes out a tendril at Dean.

Castiel cries out, tries his best to dash forward but the sheer amount of angels and stunned demons are holding him back. 

The tendril connected, it did, Castiel saw it flick across Dean's face yet, whatever spell Dean has enchanted himself with, whatever force Dean is using to be here, it's protecting him. The Entity's limb simply disintegrates, peels back, with the sound of burning leaves. 

The Shadow howls and pulls away. 

Castiel feels no empathy this time.

"Dean" Castiel says and takes advantage of the shifting bodies and makes progress towards the hunter.

"Cas!" Dean shouts, they lock eyes, then glares around him. "Move it or your next!" He warns the crowd. Many part, muttering to themselves of Winchesters, the messed up order, their sadness. These ones who've been here longer than Castiel, these ones that are weaker, these ones who are scattered and ripped asunder and craving silent sleep as much as the Entity.

But not enough fall into this category. Too many still attempt to swarm for one reason or another, trying, maybe, to reach the beautiful energy in Dean.

Castiel flares his wings, battle ready, sharp blades of dark rainbows. "Stand down!" He warns but his voice is lost in the noise.

The Empty screams and the Entity wails louder.

Then, there comes barking, rough, and fierce, and a large black dog like beast, standing on two legs and with curled horns bonds from the crowd, rounds around, and dives into the mass of lesser angels and demons.

"Back up you lot! Bugger off!" The voice is rough, scratchy, angry. The form seems so shine faintly as if there is a bit of human soul in this shaggy dog demon thing.

Castiel knows him. "Crowley?" He asks.

"Go Feather, GO!" Crowley snarls. 

Cas doesn't hesitate, he uses his strength, forcing the limits of his new powered grace, to fight the pull dragging him back, back close to the Entity. Slick black tar clings from heels, his shoulder blades, gummy tar of vile snagging his wings. He makes headway, "Dean!" He yells, now only a few feet apart.

A roar, a grace shattering level of anguish spirals a vortex filled with power, eyes, fangs, and rage. The Entity whips its limbs and lashes out, so many tendrils ensnare all it's charges, including Castiel. He feels the sharp teeth through his pants leg, through his flesh, locking into his very grace. 

Castiel lets out a cry of pain. A spiritual mental agony runs through him in waves, his failures, his mistakes. Again. Again. In a blink in an eye, he relives his time as God, his work with Metatron, his chance to tell Dean about Jack. Again, again, again. Castiel's mind goes red, layers peeled back, agony, this is agony. He wants to sleep like all the other broken beings in the Empty, lie down and surrender.

But then…

There's Dean. Here the human is,  _ his human _ , bathed in a layer of power glowing as a will of wisp, but beyond that, more importantly than the borrowed power bathing Dean is his soul, that green and gold flecked beacon. Dean's soul is before him and Castiel finds his heart break all over again from sheer ecstatic wonderment. He's crying with joy. 

But also...

A hand, Dean's strong hand, finds Castiel. Dean grips him by the wrist and Castiel grips back. For a moment, things are still and it's only Castiel and Dean.

"What you said." Dean says and Castiel is hit with a feeling, he considers that this must be a mistake, that his charge shouldn't have come, that under all the weight of his failures, this must be a dream. The look in Dean, it's open. "You...need to hear me buddy." Dean says. But Dean's eyes, green and full of tears, they are real. "Cas, don't you dare give up, Cas, Cas," and Castiel has to look away. It's too much. He can't, this is a dream, but he still remembers, he needs deeper sleep, forget his many, many wrongs, but, Dean…he doesn't deserve this...he doesn't, his mind is flayed and faced with so much glory he can't, he can't-

The hand on his wrist grips tighter. Dean searches for his gaze like he did so long ago in Zachariah's Green Room. "Cas, hey, look at me." Dean finds Castiel. The angel stares back at tearful eyes, a smile. 

"Man, I...I love you too." Dean confesses. "For such a friggin long time." He swallows. "And...and I can't do it without you."

Cas is stunned. "Dean…" His grace rises, his mind sings. His wings flex. 

The Entity tugs, hard.

"You are so stupid." Castiel says.

Dean smirks, of course he does. "Stupid for the right reasons right?"

Castiel laughs.

The Entity pulls again but Cas doesn't budge from Dean's grip. His human's eyes are burning faintly with power, a flare of silver in the green at Castiel's blue, they flicker to Castiel's healed wings. "I'm gonna need you to carry us outta here with those cool blades, can you do that, Cas?" Dean asks. 

"What do you mean?" Cas replies but Dean is already looking up and over the angel towards the monster towering over them. 

"Last chance you Captain Planet reject, let him go!" He shouts. "Whatever deal you made it's over!" 

The Shadow is beyond coherent words and simply lashes out against Dean. 

The glow shrouding Dean strips from his body as a silky wisp of glittering sand. It puts itself between Castiel and the Entity, pushes back the beast with such force and power Castiel and all the others are freed. Millions of demons and angels fall, momentarily stunned. They can only watch as the sand curls around the Shadow once before taking a shape. A towering hellhound-like beast, Leviathan heads snapping, angel wings thrashing, demon horns leveled at the Entity. 

Dean falls, clutching himself to Castiel's chest. Castiel holds on to Dean, and they are falling towards an invisible impact point, back into a pool of Shadow. He breaks open his wings, rebuilt and grand, a flash of iridescent wings that shine a dazzling shower of rainbow light, and swoops low, skimming just over the leftover shallow pools of the Empty, then shoots up high, higher. 

All around them, angels and demons are reviving, like a swarm of insects, so many different wing colors and shapes, different horns, tails, some have appearances like vessels, others border on true form. As the angels and demons come to their senses, climbing and flying, rising up, up not sure where to go, some begin to fight.

Castiel wonders what will become of them now. 

The strange beast, the Questing Beast from legend Castiel decals, that brought Dean here is tearing through The Cosmic Entity, shredding pieces off as they rage, twisting and tearing with horns and claws. The Entity for it's part writhes and wails then locks it's form around the hybrid creature and tackles it to the pitiful depths. 

The pool breaks, the Entity surfacing, arms still around it's foe as it launches high into the air. Angels and demons are knocked down, plument. 

There's a screech, great and terrible, and the Entity takes two tendrils and turns the beast's head sharply to the right. A loud crack sounds and the light of the beast flickers. And begins to turn a strange sickly green color.

Castiel can sense it. Whatever the Questing Beast is doing, it's gathering its energy for something.  _ A last attack.  _ He can feel the magic sickness on the tip of his tongue. "Dean," Castiel shouts, shaking his human. "How do we get out? Dean?"

Dean is still out, still alive but sleeping off the effort to carry the beast here.

There's a sharp, terrible tug on Castiel's leg once again. He looks down, expecting to see a tendril from a wounded but victorious Shadow but instead comes face to face with burning yellow eyes. 

"Fuck you Winchester, you aren't leaving me here." Azazel hisses. Here his true form is revealed, a gnarl of horns, thorns, and scales.

There's another hiss and the brilliant form of Lucifer, pink glittering wings, blazing red eyes, and blonde hair who lands on Castiel's back, a twisted likeness of Nick, and tears horrible claws at his feathers. "Not so fast lover boy!"

In the distance, the Shadow let out a pained, dying cry.

The concentrating power of the beast stops. 

Castiel is falling, fast now, thrashing. He uses a burst of power to free them from the nasty demon on his legs but Lucifer is another issue altogether and with Dean still asleep…

_ No! _

How could Dean be so stupid, Castiel had made his choice and peace with his fate. And now, they would both be stuck here being enterally pulled apart by their enemies.

"Hey, Clarence!" Shouts a voice. 

Castiel smiles, grace shining in glee. "Meg!" 

"Meg?" Dean awakens and blinks.

A bat winged woman with the face of a dragon skull collides with Lucifer, all fangs and hissing, sending Satan off Castiel and the two falling, falling to the end. The lesser demon is no match for Lucifer, that's no question, but she's putting up such a good fight. Her fingers are clamped tight around the other's throat, her toothy grin alight with joy as she snaps jaws on Lucifer's shoulder. 

Lucifer screams and tosses Meg off only to be slammed by another winged woman-like shape. Her skin is red, crystalized transparent stone, a fiery thing with curled horns and a flashing whip of a tail, her claws, long, thick, and sharp. "Fuck you Lucy!"

Ruby. 

"Son of a bitch!" Dean shouts. 

Castiel holds on to Dean tighter.

Lucifer flings Ruby off easily and begins to advance again only to be smashed into by a whirl of white wings. Michael.

He looks like Adam Winchester.

"Gabriel, get them out of here!" Michael commands. Then he dives, arms tearing Lucifer apart as they fall.

"Let's free you two love birds." Chirps a happy voice, Gabriel, two hands on Castiel's trenchcoat as he totes them all higher on six great golden-reddish wings. 

"Why are you helping us and why aren't you trying to escape-" Castiel begins.

With a bark of a laugh, Gabriel swings around, then, throws them. "Fly you fools!" He only calls. 

A doorway opens so close in the quivering Void before them and Castiel ignores his injured and weary wings, his need to go back and help their friends, and makes for it. "Hold on Dean!" 

A flash goes off, a bang, the Questing Beast has gone critical. The energy is being released.

"There it is Cas!" Dean is saying close to Castiel's ear. "Home."

And yes, Castiel can see to the other side, a great field of some kind, it's day on Earth, beautiful and glorious and looks so incredibly warm and he just needs to hold on a little bit longer-

A toothy tendril bites his left leg, the Entity has him, tight, dragging him back towards the Empty. He and all of the angels and demons, holding them in its death throes.

" _ No, sleep, don't leave… _ " Pleads the Empty.

Castiel can't go on, he can't, he's so incredibly tired, grace burned out, wings flickering between existence and nothing. He needs rest. Just a second to replenish, to heal.

But he can't. Not if he's going to get Dean out.

They aren't both going to make it. Cas knows.

"Dean... thank you." Cas and pushes Dean through the portal. 

There is the sound of a million voices howling at once, behind him, underneath him, all around him, there's a flash of blue, white, black tinged light, silver. A spiral of grace, a swirl of smoke, the splash of dark water. Castiel doesn't know what will happen after, but he knows somehow that the Entity will be annihilated and something better will arise for angels and demons alike.

It just won't have Dean…

Cas feels his grace sink.

Then…there is the green, a wave of oncoming powerful magic from the Questing Beast's mushroom cloud.

Castiel turns away from the bomb, back to the door and Dean, eyes pained, running to the opening, reaching out…

Cas' wounded wings give out, they close tight around his body, soft now, feathers no longer ready to fight and tired as the rest of him. He begins to fall.

A crackle of blue and purple, white hot and quick, a sudden gust of wind pushes him up, closer to the edge, just enough. There is a dark skinned woman in the corner of Castiel's eye.

"Go little brother." Raphael says.

Castiel turns, to ask why.

"There was a time, before my sleep, before the end....before father left us..." Raphael says. 

But the wave of energy is coming, snapping through angels and demons, Castiel can't comprehend what's happening to them. He just knows there's no more time. 

So does Raphael. She's somehow shielding them from the fallout, or healing them, both perhaps, but she won't be able to do it for long.

"I looked after you. I am sorry I lost the way." There are tears in her eyes. "There will be time for me to be the Healer I once was, but for now…" she sends another torrent of wind and Castiel is up, flapping his wings to bring him close enough to the door in the Empty.

"Goodbye Castiel." Raphael says.

Dean grabs Castiel by his trenchcoat's shoulder, hard, digging in his nails. "Damn it, Cas!!!" He screams, digs his feet in the dirt on the other side and  _ pulls _ .

And just like that, Cas is out, pulled on top of Dean and they fall to the dirty, earthy, onion field in a heap. 

With one final distant triumphant howl of the Questing beast, the portal behind them closes.

\-----

Dean takes a breath, deeply, of the smell of a storm, trenchcoat, and salt as he lay in the dirt. Oh and onion, lots of fucking onion. "Oops, the second portal missed the mark I guess. Sorry about that." He wheezes under the angel. A shuddering angel.

"Cas?" Dean asks. He wonders if Cas is beating himself up over everyone they'd left behind. He hopes the frick not but he wouldn't be shocked. Dean feels a little bad but he's mostly just ecstatic they both made it out and-

Cas sits up, right on Dean's stomach and Dean's trying really, really hard not to think of certain things he'd love to do but more importantly, love to have done to him.

"You stupid, stupid, collection of bad impulses in a meat sack, I swear if I wasn't so exhausted I'd turn you into an actual squirrel, Dean, the Questing Beast? Where in the world did you get an idea like that? The Entity is dead now, where are all the dead angels and demons going to go now? Lucifer? Back to Hell? Really Dean? Dean? Are you listening to me?" Cas is growling.

Not helping Dean's thought process one bit. 

*Yeah and what about you trying to sacrifice yourself again? What the Hell man, really?"

Dean lays his head down back in the dirt, staring up at Cas. "And look, I'm sure Jack will figure things out, oh, yeah, he's God now."

Castiel blinks those big blue eyes of his. "What?" 

Oh hell, Cas looks so silly and adorable, fuck it, Dean's fine admitting it to himself now, they just faced down how many of their worse foes? Came out of the friggn garbage disposal in one piece. So Dean waggles his eyebrows. "Hey, Cas, can we just kiss now?"

Cas bluescreens and then repeats. "...What?" 

"Come on Cas, remember, what you said, ya know," Dean blushes a little, despite his decision a second ago about admitting things, he does feel a sharp pull to stop, he punches it in the face and goes on," what you said, before  _ your _ stupid feathery ass gave himself for me? And I swear, I tried to tell you back in Purgatory and then, well, look, I just, you do remember...right? That did happen right?" Dean begins to feel unsure again.

"Of course." Cas cocks up an eyebrow. "I said, 'I love you', Dean." Cas says, staring at Dean in that way he does, blue eyes dazzling and wide like Dean is some great star in the sky and not a complete fuck up. "And yes, I remember, it's true. I do, I sometimes question why that is, given your choices sometimes and your fondness for Western films, but yes, I love you." 

Dean smiles, not a smirk, a full blown smile in the glow of the happy shock at hearing it again, away from life or death doom. He licks his lips and says, "And I, you, Cas." 

And then Cas is down, over him, kissing Dean, gently nibbling at his lips. Dean opens his mouth and they are laughing between tongue dancing, snorting from adrenaline, joy, and the feeling of finally finding home. Cas and Dean are making out in some farmer's field, tearing at each other's clothing, trailing fingers through each other's hair, and even though they are both still slick with eldritch goo, sweaty and stinky, rolling around in onion stalks, Dean is the happiest he's been. 

When they finally put back their clothes, stand, and Cas uses his repaired wings to fly them back to the barn, Dean is holding Cas' hand and doesn't let go even when Sammy and Eileen tackle Cas with hugs.

Dean only lets go of Cas' when, with the whoosh of feathers, Jack appears. Jack starts to say something about popping in every now and then but rarely because of past mistakes by Chuck and then, suddenly, God has tears in his eyes. He rushes forward and clings to his dad.

"I'm so proud of you Jack." Cas whispers in Jack's hair and more too but Dean can't hear most of it.

Dean cries and he can't stop it so he also hugs Jack, Cas opens his arms to latch around them both. Dean feels Sammy crush him as his younger brother piles in, smells the sweet orange scent of Eileen when she throws herself around them too and yes, ok so  _ this _ ,  **_this_ ** is the happiest Dean has ever been. 

Dean never thought he'd live to see  **_this_ ** , everyone happy and safe, himself loved and loving Cas and damn if he's glad he's here with his family.


	2. New Order

"Well, that was a bloody ride." Crowley says, dusting off his suit jacket. "Damn thing just spat us out of the muck like we were frogs."

"Offmf, you got that right grouchy pug." Gabriel ran a hand through his hair, happy to find it black goo free. 

"Finally!" Wails Ruby. "Free of that annoying bitch!"

"At least they didn't like using  _ your _ face." Meg rolls her eyes. She's glad to be free from the Empty and their weird fascination with her.

"Quiet." Raphael says, she's in her last vessel, or at least, in a form like her last vessel, staring daggers around the room they are in. "Where are we?" There are shelves of books, file cabinets, scattered throughout, piles of paper on the carpeted floor. Even more sheets of paper are attached to the steel walls.

"Looks like a pathetic accountant's office." Snips Lucifer. "A sad little number cruncher."

There's a cough.

"Excuse me." Says a voice.

They all turn, looking forward and see a brown skinned man, Anubis, Raphael knows, sitting at a desk, holding an abacus between slender hands. Behind him looms a large white clock.

Anubis raises an eyebrow.

"There's a ton of you so please step forward, I need to begin." Anubis says.

"Begin what?" Asks Gadreel. "You're...going to weigh our souls? But we don't have-" Gadreel frowns, his appearance that of his last vessel like so many of them here. He looks rather tired but curious.

Anubis grins. "Changes from up high. Those that might be helpful, might be good, well, we'll find a place for you, perhaps reincarnation to try again, perhaps to help in Hell, perhaps...to aid in Heaven, or…"

"This is...." Michael trails off. "Unusual." 

Raphael says nothing, simply watches. She too finds this new change to be slightly unorthodox but finds it better than the Empty. So, she waits.

Too bad her calmness isn't shared by her older brother.

"Hey, I for one rather not go to the great tar pit if that's cool with you!" Lucifer chirps and steps right up to the desk. "Do me, do me." The words are layered with something more sensual and sexual than necessary. 

Raphael can't help a sneer of disgust.

Anubis chuckles. "Sure."

And so it begins, Lucifer is the first of millions of felled demons and angels to have their deeds weighed.

Lucifer doesn't get the results he thinks he deserves. Which, is to say, he gets reincarnated into a human.

  
  



End file.
